ISTE 2015

District-Wide Twitter Contest

Thanks for stopping by my poster session at ISTE 2015! On this page you can find:

1. ISTE Standards addresses in this poster session/activity
2. Link to my Twitter Resources Page
3. Link to my blog post reflection about the district-wide Twitter contest
4. Suggestions for implementing your own Twitter contest
5. A Storify slideshow of all the Tweets from the challenges
6. An embedded Google Sheet of each challenge

I’d love your feedback; don’t forget to review my sessions in the ISTE 2015 Conference App or by clicking here! 

ISTE Standards Addressed

This poster session and activity addresses the following ISTE Standards:

Administrators, Standard 2: Digital-Age Learning Culture
Coaches, Standard 3: Digital Age Learning Environment
Coaches, Standard 4: Professional Development and Program Evaluation
Teachers, Standard 3: Model Digital Age Work and Learning
Teachers, Standard 5: Engage in Professional Growth and Leadership

Twitter Resources

If you’re interested in holding your own Twitter PD, or just interested in walking yourself through using Twitter in education, check out my Twitter Resources page. It has all the links I use when leading a Twitter PD session with teachers and administrators.

Reflection on the Twitter Contest

I wrote a blog post shortly after the Twitter contest. You can read it by clicking here. I’ve also included a blurb from my post with my suggestions for implementing your own district or school-wide Twitter contest below.

Suggestions to Implement Your Own Challenge (from my blog):

To implement your own challenge, here are my suggestions:

• Lead a face-to-face training first. People feel more brave and willing to step out of their comfort zone when they have a buddy (you!) by their side. This will show them the ropes and get them comfortable following people and sending tweets.
• Create a list of tasks that are very simple, and will only take seconds to minutes to do. Our to-do lists are already out of control, so no one wants to sign up to do something that’s going to take a long time, every day, for an extended period of time.
• Tasks should encourage participants to learn a new aspect of Twitter, make new connections or share new resources.
• Include a task that encourages participants to get their “classroom neighbor” to join, so others who did not attend your initial training can start Tweeting.
• Include a task that encourages participants to check out a Twitter chat, so they can see the real power of Twitter.
• Create a list of the tasks each day, so teachers can see what’s coming, complete their task early if needed or go back to catch up. I created my list in a Google Spreadsheet that I shared out by creating a shortened URL with bit.ly (see my challenges below).
• Offer prizes for participants and the winners! I also created a certificate of participation for every teacher who participated (even one tweet, one day).
• I would probably only do 15 days if I did this again. I think cutting it in half would seem like less of a commitment, and potentially encourage more people to participate. The momentum was still gong strong on Day 15, but by day 30 the participation had dwindled significantly.

Participants Tweets

List of Challenges: